


Staircase Wit

by meggannn



Category: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
Genre: Angst and Humor, Friendship, Gen, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-04
Updated: 2019-12-30
Packaged: 2020-04-07 20:47:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 19,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19092835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meggannn/pseuds/meggannn
Summary: The mask is just a mask without someone behind it, and over twenty-two years Peter has perfected the whole Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man thing to an art. When he puts in the effort.When.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> When I imagined this fic several months ago, I intended it to be a series of several short one-shots "filling in" spots from the film where I saw opportunities to expand on Miles and Peter B and their relationship. This evolved into something with a... loose structure, but the core idea is pretty much the same: each chapter should roughly stand on its own and follow some moments or scenes where I wanted to get into someone's head, or I wondered what else might've happened to get them from point A to B.
> 
> Coding resources used: [Deadpool-style comic boxes](https://teekettle.tumblr.com/post/120631771129/example-text-seem-familiar-well-it-should-so)

The bite is itching again.

Miles groans, rolls out of bed and lands, feet hitting the floor with identical thuds. His ankles ache for it. Ganke is still awake, but has his headphones on: if the sting of his hand hadn’t kept him awake tonight, Miles is certain the glowing light of the laptop and steady clacking of the keyboard would’ve done it.

“Do you have any Neosporin,” he tries to say, but a yawn swallows the last word. He shuffles over to the closet.

“Hnn?”

“Nevermind.”

The clock reads 2:15 AM. Miles doesn’t have enough brainpower to calculate how much sleep he’s not getting tonight. The only thing in the world that matters right now is alleviating the sting of his hand. It has grown puffy and swollen from his frantic and frequent scratching sessions, each one hoping this time, this time will do it, he’s scratching the itch completely out of it this time and _I’m not DOING this again, and what the HELL was that spider made out of?_

His good hand finally finds the smooth corner of his mom’s first aid kit. She had insisted Miles take one with him when he moved into Visions. Like so many other things, Miles had begrudgingly agreed to it then, but is grateful for his mother’s foresight now. He pops it open and squints, hunting for the pink tinge of calamine lotion in the dark.

“Sorry to keep you up,” Ganke says.

“What?”

Ganke’s keyboard and mouse are tap-clacking in the familiar dance of the everyday multitasking student. “I’ve still got the lab write-up for Mr. Chase left so I’m gonna be a while longer. Also a Trackmagnet just caught onto me and I’m _thisclose_ to wrapping up the final floor but I gotta go back and lose him cause I don’t wanna start this dungeon over tomorrow…” 

Miles takes the whole kit and tosses it up onto his pillow before climbing back up the rungs. “You’re playing Underminer at two in the morning, man?”

“If you don’t keep your rank up for 3 days, it decays,” Ganke said mournfully, eyes never leaving the screens. His three monitors all display different things; even at low brightness, just glancing their way gives Miles a headache. “And I missed playing this weekend cause I was visiting my grandma.”

Crossed-legged on his bed, Miles finds the calamine lotion off the light of the many laptops, and awkwardly smothers it over the surface of his right hand. The puffiness has swollen to the size of a dollar coin. He finds a square bandage and awkwardly rips it open. Mami would chide him for wasting it on something as small as a spider bite, but then, his mom and dad aren’t here right now because the entire point of sending him to Visions was to turn him into a man who made his own decisions or whatever, and solving The Problem of the Itchy Hand that’s preventing him from sleep is feeling like one of the best decisions he’s had in a long while right about now. Certainly smarter than agreeing to this school in the first place…

He deserves to be awake and working like Ganke. Specifically working on that paper Mrs. Adler assigned, because she will not have forgotten about it in the next eight hours. She’ll pull him aside after third period and ask about his progress and he’ll have to come up with some excuse that doesn’t end in _Sorry, but I snuck out of my dorm last night because thinking about the person I want to be just made me want to hang out with that person instead, not write a stupid paper about it._

Slowly, Miles drifts off to the sound of the keyboard. If this damn bite is still swollen in the morning, he’ll go to the nurse.

* * *

Blaring sounds. Miles spreads an arm wide, fumbling to hit snooze —

The crash of his alarm clock smashing on the floor jolts him fully awake. Squinting, he peers over the bed. Looks at the black plastic and cracked screen scattered over the linoleum below.

That’d been a gift from his dad when he went to middle school. Great. He flops back to the pillow and closes his eyes, willing himself back to sleep. He’ll remember to wake up in five more minutes.

“Holy shit,” Ganke’s sleepy voice mutters from across the room. “Sounded bad.” A pause and a grunt. “What timezit.”

“Seven,” Miles mutters without opening his eyes.

He had been dreaming about… something. The design he’d sprayed from last night? Something colorful. Something with red and blue, something with pink and yellow. He remembers liking it. Wants to sketch it out, but he can’t recall the details. A dream like looking through a kaleidoscope. An entire world colored in his artstyle…

Outside, the light sounds of car horns and construction across the street begin to rumble. It’s definitely been longer than five minutes, but he can’t bring himself to check.

Eventually, Miles hears a yawn and the sounds of shuffling. “Time to get up, Air Jordan,” Ganke’s voice says.

Miles grunts.

After another few minutes, he forces his weary limbs to the edge of the bed, and hops down onto the floor, into the same pair of pants from yesterday. Rubs at an eye and pulls them up his legs.

Blinks, clearing his head from the fog of sleep. Rolls the pants back down carefully and then pulls them back up again.

There’s a good two inches of space between the pant leg and his ankle. Hadn’t his mother hemmed these herself?

“Think I have your pants,” he says.

“I’m wearing my pants.” Ganke doesn’t turn around; he’s back on the keyboard, now fully awake. “Those are definitely yours. They’re too skinny for me.”

Ganke’s right, the fit matches him nearly everywhere else. Miles feels hyper-aware of his limbs in a way he’s never felt before: the hair on his arms raises, like goosebumps. His fingertips are numb. Is this the growth spurt Uncle Aaron told him to wait for? Maybe it’s like, late stage puberty. Is there a part two to this kind of thing?

“…I don’t know, dude,” Ganke says slowly. “But this relationship’s gonna get real weird real quick if you’re asking me to give you the talk.”

Miles is suddenly, horrifyingly aware that he has been speaking aloud.

“Sorry,” he says out loud, carefully.

Miles holds his nose and pops his ears, hoping vaguely that’s solved the problem. If that didn’t — he’ll figure it out later. He resists the urge to tilt his head and rattle it around, trying to shake out whatever’s trapped buzzing in his head, very aware that acting like a lunatic wouldn’t improve his image in front of his roommate. He and Ganke are friendly, but not friends. He’s already the awkward thirteen-year-old try-hard new guy who skipped a grade; he doesn’t want to be the babyfaced kid who had to have puberty explained to him too.

“Heading out,” Ganke says. He’s fully dressed, headphones around his neck, tie over his shoulder, and beanie smashed over his messy black hair, violating at least three school uniform rules. “You going to breakfast?”

“Nah, I’ve got a granola bar.”

“You can’t survive off of snack food,” Ganke says smugly as he heads out the door. “You’re a growing young boy, Miles Morales, your body needs nutrition.”

Miles employs a choice insults in Spanish that would make his mother very unhappy, and finishes dressing. He still feels vaguely odd, an emotional dizziness he can’t quite shake, but pushes it off for another time.

* * *

An hour later, after he has sticky-walked across the security officer’s ceiling, mortifyingly ripped half of Wanda’s pretty hair out of her skull, and thoroughly ruined his reputation in front of all of Brooklyn Visions, Miles lays on the floor of his room, half-naked and panting. The adrenaline and fear pumping through him is at odds with the chilly air drifting through the window, but the inside of his head is a wild storm of questions and nausea.

The surreal, stuffed-head feeling is worse than ever: his vision is dotting, he’s got a headache the size of Queens, and the closest explanation feels like, like —

Things just feel wrong, off. Physically, mentally. Miles pauses. Metaphysically? Like a three-dimensional figure trapped in 2-D space. Ceilings and floors have switched. Reality has changed.

This isn’t puberty.

Is his nose bleeding?

One of Ganke’s comics flutters onto his face, disturbed by the commotion that had led him careening through the window.

The sensation of pages touching his sensitive skin is one thing too many. He swaps it away, furious — and it sticks to his fingers, because of course it does. Frustrated and panicked, he tries throwing it at the wall, flicking his fingers, shaking his hands, nothing, _nothing, nothing is working, WHY IS THIS HAPPENING! WHAT —_

**IS GOING ON?**

He employs both hands, which will make the problem worse, he’s too desperate to care — and the paper rips. Now he’ll owe Ganke a replacement for his super-whatever comic, his —

Spider-Man comic?

The universe slows and centers around the pages in his hand. Miles stares. This comic book; this story of a teenage boy, _with great power comes great responsibility_. Is it an answer, or another problem? Is this a solution?

**THIS IS SPIDER-MAN’S ORIGIN STORY.**

Miles slowly rises, placing the ripped pages side by side in order across on the floor. Puzzle pieces of a story unfold across uneven comic panels and torn lines: the nerdy, high school-aged Billy Barker sticks to walls, loses his glasses, accidentally breaks the tap off his sink faucet, _doesn’t know his own strength —_

**HE WAS BITTEN BY A SPIDER. YOU WERE BITTEN BY A SPIDER.**

Miles runs fingers over the back of his right hand. The skin is smooth. The bite has vanished.

**HE BECAME A SUPERHERO OVERNIGHT. YOU —**

“Stop,” Miles says aloud. “Stop, stop, stop. You’re wrong.”

**SPIDER-MAN WAS JUST AN AVERAGE KID. LIKE YOU.**

“I’m a normal kid,” Miles repeats. “I’m a normal kid. _I’m a normal kid. I’m —_ ”

* * *

**I’M A NORMAL KID. IT WAS A NORMAL SPIDER.**

Miles sprints through Prospect Park, vaguely aware that he’s running harder, faster, further than he has ever in his life, and he’s not even breaking a sweat.

“Uncle Aaron pickuppickuppickuppickup — ”

“Hey, it’s Aaron. I’m out of town for a few days, I’ll hit you when I’m — ”

**MOVE!**

The car comes out of nowhere. His legs move without instruction, propelling him out of harm’s way: if he had been a second later, his head would’ve been a smear across the pavement.

Dazed, Miles comes back to reality at the sound of people clapping. He had just leapt fifteen feet in the air to avoid a car. Had he? Yes, he had. Yes, he had. Oh my god. That just happened.

One guy whistles, laughing.

“I’m not — that wasn’t.” Miles gestures with his hands, frantic. The static in his head is loud again, his heart racing. “I, ignore you saw that — ”

“Hey, kid, you okay?” The cab driver is leaning out the window, but Miles is already gone.

* * *

He waits the entire day. For the buzzing in his ears to die, for his dad to find and lecture him for skipping school, for Uncle Aaron to return his calls, for Spider-Man to climb in through the window and say _“Don’t worry, kid, there’s been a mistake — I’ve got everything covered. You can go home now.”_

Nothing happens. Nobody finds him. Nobody is looking.

He scrubs at his ears again. The fuzzing in his head is better now that he’s stopped freaking out. He had spent the day curled up on his uncle’s couch, stomach in knots, alternating between ravenous hunger and feeling like he never wanted to eat anything again. After hours of distracting himself with _Simon and Simpleton_ reruns, games on his phone, and sorting his uncle’s music library, he was feeling a bit calmer, though not at ease. He’d even tried directing all his feelings out on the punching bag, but just one hit had send it swinging back and crashing into the wall, chain rattling. He hadn’t tried again.

Nobody else seems different. The world hasn’t changed, but he had. Maybe he’s just crazy now. Maybe the spider bite is making him hallucinate?

The spider… 

He hadn’t got a good look at it. The story always said Billy was bitten by a _radioactive_ spider, but what kind of radioactive spiders lived in Brooklyn subway tunnels?

Miles picks at the mac and cheese he had made himself for dinner. As much as he wants to, he couldn’t call his mom; she would tell Dad. His biggest wish is for his uncle to return his voicemail. Uncle Aaron said he’d done engineering jobs down there; maybe he’d know what kind of weird goo the spider might’ve stepped in to make it radioactive? 

Miles searches the living room for any sign of the contract work his uncle might have been doing, but can only find the remains of couple of incomplete projects and a welding torch. He almost works up the nerve to search the bedroom too — Uncle Aaron wouldn’t have minded at all, and yet he hesitates. One of his favorite things about his uncle is how openly he welcomes him; Aaron is his 2 AM call whenever he feels lonely or annoyed or just weird and bored. Whenever he was younger and stayed the night, his uncle would let him sleep in his huge bed with the head of the mattress that moved up and down. Aaron would laugh as he played with the remote, updown updown updown, and never told him to cut it out, always letting Miles play around on his own time. But standing on the threshold of his uncle’s room now, he couldn’t bring himself to go in. He’s been in here all the time, but it just feels wrong. This is wrong. Everything is so wrong.

Even if Uncle Aaron couldn’t help him, Miles felt like he would at least know what to do. Someone had to know, somewhere, what to do.

The real Spider-Man could help him.

Miles dismisses that thought as soon as it occurrs to him. Ganke’s the bigger Spider-Man fan, he would probably know how to find him, but… 

_Miles, where the hell did you go?_

_Miles, what did you do to the new girl’s head? Her hair looks like it got caught in a blender. You made her so embarrassed she started crying at lunch._

_Dude, you’re so screwed. Mrs. Adler kept talking about how important attendance was and everyone knows she was talking about you. I can’t be your friend if you’re gonna be like this, man._

He can’t go back to Visions.

But he could go back to the tunnel. He could go back and see for himself.

He cleans the dishes and straightens the sofa before he leaves. Pausing on the way out, he takes his uncle’s spare key from the keyhook, just in case — 

Just in case.

* * *

The Q drops him off at Delkab Avenue twenty minutes later.

Miles waits on a worn bench, fooling around on his phone until everyone on the platform has trudged up the stairs, before he drops down to the subway tracks. The display screen above says the next train is coming in three minutes, but knowing the MTA, he figures he has at least seven to find the tunnel again or risk getting smushed.

A short jog down the tracks later, and he finds the entrance by the light of the flashlight on his phone. Miles bites his lip at the sight of the gate again. He breaths, then takes a running leap. His foot hits the door panel and projects him up quicker than he expected — he grasps the top of the gate, swinging over easily. He lands quiet as a cat on the other side.

Miles takes the steps down cautiously to find the rotunda with his art. It’s colder down here, more than yesterday. Maybe they don’t turn on the heat in these old tunnels so often.

He tries the lights — they blink on to illuminate the room, flicker twice, and then with a faint hiss, die out.

He swallows.

He scans the dark rotunda by the light of his phone. On the opposite wall, his art is untouched. There’s the couch where his uncle had sat. Down one of the halls, he hears a faint rumbling of machinery, but everything here looks just as it did yesterday. He searches the center of the room with his light, and finds a black speck, too large to be dirt, lying innocently in the center in front of his mural, next to group of paint cans.

The echoes of machinery fade. There’s nothing but the sound of his own breath in the dark.

The spider is belly-up. He creeps closer.

It stays dead.

It doesn’t wake up, or speak to him, or turn into a monster spider. It’s just dead.

And Miles is alone.

“It’s a normal spider,” he says aloud. He’s suddenly furious and ashamed. It was a stupid, comic book scenario he had been concocting in his head; his wild, improbable idea that Spider-Man would be waiting for him down here to explain everything, that he could make everything better, was just that. “You came all the way to Brooklyn Heights to look at a dead spider, Miles.” He reaches down, grabbing one of the several old, forgotten paint markers littering the floor. “It’s _boring_ how normal this spider is — ”

Miles nudges it with the edge of the pen, and the spider body — there’s no other word for it — glitches. It’s like looking directly at the sun; color spots flash directly in his eyes. Miles gasps, scrunches them shut, rearing back.

In the dark, the world settles. The lights fade behind his eyelids. He peeks one open. Haloed by the window of light on the floor, the black speck is still again.

A long, low screech sounds in the distance echoes, startling him. A slow grind of machinery picks up again, seconds behind.

Miles raises the light. It’s coming from the corridor on his right, down a flight of maintenance stairs. Pitch black.

His feet move slowly, acting for him. Creeping down the steps, Miles feels as though he’s being puppeteered, driven by instinct. A set of intertwining blue pipes run down the stairs with him, pointing the way. He follows the light of his phone slowly, like a moth to a flame, hand moving without his direction.

The light wavers when he reaches the bottom of the stairs. His head swims.

**WHY IS THIS HAPPENING TO ME…?**

The flashlight moves left, trailing off into a new room divided by a thick curtain. The blue pipes have grown thicker now, the size of tree trunks. They lead under the curtain. Miles follows, mindless.

Yellow and black hazard warning signs on the walls… _RADIATION WARNING. ALCHEMEX._ As he passes, they change colors before his eyes. Blue, orange.

A headache is forming, and a throbbing pain between his eyes. His skull is pounding, breath coming faster.

Center of the dark room. His steps disturb old dust from the floor. Control panels. An observation room?

The glass that lines the wall in front of him is filthy, dimly lit by whatever lies on the other side. He peers; can’t see anything through the grime. The room is… humming. His flashlight wavers. His hand is shaking. Spots in his eyes.

Where is he being led? What is he doing here?

 _YOU’RE LIKE ME._  
_I DON’T WANT TO BE A HERO._  
_LOOK OUT._  
_THAT’S ALL IT IS, MILES._  
_YOU’RE LIKE ME._

The pressure is overwhelming. Miles clutches his head, shaking. He can’t think. Blood dribbles down his nose. He sees spots behind his eyelids.

The hair on his arm raises.

**LOOK OUT.**

Miles ducks.

* * *

_I DON’T —_

“ — want to be a hero. I don’t want to be a hero.” His breath catches, panic clouding every sense. Tears are running down his cheeks. The rumble of giant machinery churns around him, reverberating in the chamber like a slowly waking beast. “Oh god. Oh god please.”

High above him, a red figure launches out of the tunnel and swings out of view.

Far below his dangling feet, Green Goblin lies unmoving where he had crushed an observation deck into a mess of steel pipes and shrapnel. The behemoth groans, hulking shoulders shifting, but doesn’t get up.

Miles dangles precariously, clinging to the chamber wall. His brain works in overtime, heart hammering. If he can stick to things, maybe he can climb too. He can inch back up to the tunnel. He’ll go straight home. He’ll call his dad and come clean. He’ll forget he ever saw this. Oh god. One move at a time.

He lifts one hand and reaches upward, sticking fast. His legs swing below him, searching for purchase. Okay. He lifts the other hand and —

falls —

A scream rips out of his throat. Green Goblin is coming closer and closer and nothing is slowing the fall, he’s going to die, he’s going to die, and —

 _twip_ —

Movement — he jerks sideways —

He’s flying through the air, but in the wrong direction. Someone has him by the jacket.

Momentum moves him upward, and above him, he catches a glimpse of a red and blue suit —

The mask looks downard. Sees him looking. One of the eyes winks.

Spider-Man has him by the jacket.

Eyes stinging, Miles closes his eyes against the wind, and forces himself to breathe.

Spider-Man tosses them upward, and Miles’s stomach jumps to his throat just before they land. Gentle hands set him down on the platform. He opens his eyes.

“Out for a nightly stroll in the beautiful Brooklyn sewers?” Spider-Man pauses, then mutters as if to himself, “Says something about my job that I could actually recommend a few, now.” His voice is very soothing, calm with an ambiguous age. Those tapered white eyes are so huge in person, so bug-like. And staring right at him.

“Uh,” Miles says.

“You know your shoes are untied?”

“Uh-huh.”

“This is a onesie,” Spider-Man continues, “so I don’t really have to worry about that kind of thing. Though the boots do get a little sweaty. It doesn’t really matter, but then, sometimes it’s just one thing that just ruins your day, you know?”

Spider-Man is handling him. Spider-Man is talking nonsense so Miles stops freaking out and calms the hell down. There are dried tears on his cheeks, and blood from his nose. And Spider-Man is crouching in front of him and being nice.

“Hey.” Spider-Man is talking to him again, leaning closer. A red hand gently touches his knee, shakes it slightly. “Just take it easy. You’re gonna be oka — ”

It happens again.

The headache pulses, overwhelming; Miles flinches. But it eases after a moment, not quite softer, but dulls, like a tolerable static sensation from earlier. He looks ahead — Spider-Man is still. Miles realizes that he’s staring straight at him, and he suddenly feels —

Seen. Understood.

The sensation fades, and Spider-Man is completely still. If it were possible for a mask to look thrown off guard… Finally he speaks, wonder in his voice: “You’re like me.”

Miles swallows. For all of the chaos today, the questions, that’s what it all meant. He has his answer.

“Did you know about me?” he asks wondrously.

“I thought I was the only one.” Spider-Man is talking to himself again. “If there are others out there — ” He pauses, and refocuses on Miles. This close, Miles can see the threads in the suit, the plates protecting his eyes. It suddenly strikes him that there is a real guy inside the suit, a real person who could lift trucks and fly across midtown in ten minutes and he could save millions, and that person is looking straight at him. Those white eyes don’t seem creepy anymore, just — curious.

Miles finds his voice. “I’m — I think it was an accident. Like, you’re already Spider-Man. I don’t need…” What is he saying? “Like, this is… I’m not sure what…”

Spider-Man listens. It seems like he’s doing some deep thinking. When Miles finally trails off, he asks, “Was it a spider bite?”

“Yeah. And — I just meant to say I think it was a mistake,” Miles says quickly, “and I don’t want… I don’t need to — it seems like you… have everything covered.”

Spider-Man is very quiet. A beat passes.

“Probably seems that way,” he says finally. “I suppose I get along. But we could all use a hand now and again.” The red head tilts. “You don’t always get to choose what happens to you, kiddo,” he says gently, “but you can choose what you do with it.”

Miles swallows.

Spider-Man shifts, rebalancing his weight. “But listen. You’re gonna be okay. I know how crazy it gets.” He holds his hands up, like he’s afraid Miles will get scared off if he moves too suddenly. “I can help you, if you want. If you stick around, I could show you the ropes. That sound okay?” He huffs softly. “Or too terrifying?”

The ropes of being Spider-Man. This is really happening.

He wants to say no. But this guy — whoever he is, this strange friend behind the mask — went through the same thing once upon a time, and he went through it alone, and now look at him.

Miles tries to imagine himself behind the same mask, doing the same things. All he can imagine is a slideshow reel of himself falling from buildings; adult passerby clucking and tsking when he can’t stop a bunch of criminals; his dad standing over him, yelling at him in the living room as Miles stands in a cheap Spider-Man suit looking at the floor, mask clutched in his hands. 

But… something in those huge white eyes is eager, inviting. He doesn't want to disappoint whoever this is. And part of him — a very small part, the part that isn’t terrified of what his dad will say when he finds out — is curious, too.

Could he?

Uncle Aaron would tell him to go for it. He wouldn’t even hesitate.

He swallows down his anxiety and says, more confidently than he feels, “Sounds okay.”

Spider-Man doesn’t reply, but Miles can tell that behind the mask, he’s smiling.

* * *

  
  
  
  
  


_NO! NO!_

_DON’T DO THIS! STOP!_

_YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT IT CAN DO, YOU’LL_

 

dont get what

en this weird thing happe

ill do it

dont have it ye

hes just a kid

 

 

_KILL US ALL!_

  
  
  
  
  


* * *

Miles wakes coughing, throat full of dust. Dizzy and nauseous, he opens his eyes. It takes him a moment to process the detached steel beam hovering dangerously above his head.

He gasps, scrabbling back on the dirty floor. His hands smart; he bumps into a collapsed wooden structure and sends steel poles rolling. Inhaling more dust, he coughs harder, throat burning, eyes watering. He wipes the blood from under his nose, the tears from his eyes with his coat sleeve.

Pushing onto his aching hands, he hisses when he realizes he’s bleeding: his hands are cut and his jacket sleeve is torn, revealing a shallow gash in his forearm. Miles glances up above, squinting in the dim light through the dust clouds and rubble.

He stands slowly, and when the vertigo doesn’t get worse, he starts to walk, head low, rubbing at his eyes. Vision clearing, on his left, he catches glimpse of an enormous clawed hand lying motionless underneath a mountain of collapsed steel.

He squints. Across a small clearing dotted with debris is…

He hurries forward.

“Hey — ” Tipping over his shoelaces, he reaches the prone figure half-buried underneath a pile of debris. “Mister uh — Spider-Man — are you okay?”

The red suit stirs.

“Sir?”

Spider-Man groans. “No formalities, kid.” His voice is hoarse; Miles’s own throat aches worse listening to him. “I’m fine… Just resting.” He coughs. It sounds wet.

“…s probably not a good sign,” Spider-Man says quietly.

With a burst of clarity, Miles realizes — Spider-Man needs him. He has a flash of inspiration.

“I can get you to help,” he promises. “My mom’s a nurse. Can you walk?”

Spider-Man groans, tries to move. Miles realizes that one of his legs is being pinned down by a heavy steel beam. That’s definitely a no.

Desperate, he offers, “I can try to carry you. Let me just move this stuff — ” He starts to shift some of the debris, but a glove hand stops his wrist.

Those big white eyes turn toward him. The mask has been torn; a real blue eye looks blearily at him through one of the cracked lenses. Miles can see bruised skin and pricks of blood where Spider-Man’s face been cut by the shards of broken eye plating.

Noises from behind them. Miles turns; shadows are moving, growing bigger.

“Hey — you ready for your first superhero assignment?”

Miles swivels back around. He’s making jokes?

“I need you to do something for me.” Spider-Man’s hand shakes as he raises something up — it’s a worn USB. Miles clutches the red hand in both of his own. “This override key will stop the collider.” He gestures with his other hand, pointing wearily to the ceiling. “Swing up there… use this key, push the button. Boom.” One hand gestures weakly, imitating a fake explosion.

He takes several breaths in a row. They sound shallow. “Sorry I didn’t write down the instructions. Don’t worry. I’ll grade you on a curv — ”

He breaks down into a worse coughing fit. This one sounds much wetter than the last. Terrified of the noise attracting attention, Miles looks back at the shadows. They move in the fog but haven’t come closer yet.

“Sorry man,” Spider-Man mutters. “I coulda warned you that restaurant was a black hole…”

Miles looks back at him. He’s staring off into the distance.

“Nice look, Gwen. Ahh now I’m jealous…”

Who is Gwen? Bewildered and horrified, Miles searches for words. Is Spider-Man hallucinating? No. Nononono, he needs him to do something, say something. He can’t do this he can’t do this he can’t

“Spider-Man?” he tries.

That blue eye refocuses back on him. “Yeah. Yeah. Hey, kid.” He seems to find himself. He clutches Miles’s hand weakly. “You need to hide your face. Don’t tell anyone who you are. No one can know. He’s got everyone in his pocket — ”

“What? Who?” Fear prickles the back of Miles’s neck. He has a sudden unshakable sensation that they’re being watched from every direction.

“If he turns the machine on again, everything you know will disappear. Your family, everyone — ” He squeezes Miles’s hand. “Everyone.” A pause. Miles waits for him to continue, agast. 

“Promise me,” Spider-Man says finally. “Promise me you’ll do this.”

Miles swallows.

“I promise.”

“Your dad would understand,” Spider-Man says. Miles freezes, until he continues. “It served its purpose. You’ll make a new one, Pen.”

Talking to himself again. Miles feels his heart sink. He wants to cry. “Who — who are you talking to?” His voice chokes; speaking is hard. _Do not cry. Do not cry here, not now._

Spider-Man finds his eyes again. “You,” he says. But he’s not really seeing Miles, not really here anymore. “You promised me. You’ll do it. I know you will.” He lets his hand fall, leaving the USB in Miles’s grip. “I’ll see you soon…”

Miles swallows his tears. Feeling embarrassed and childish, he can’t help but ask, wants to hear him say, “You’ll come find me?” 

“Ye — ” A grunt, and his hoarse voice reassures, “I’ll find you, kid.” Quieter now, as if to himself: “I always get up.” He nods in the direction of the chamber ceiling. “Go.”

Reluctantly, heart in his throat, Miles leaves him, footsteps light. Before turning around a mountain of collapsed paneling, he stops and looks back.

Miles wants to say something else — something encouraging or meaningful that will get him on his feet. A proper goodbye, or a thank you. Maybe if he hadn’t been here tonight, Spider-Man would’ve destroyed the collider without having to stop to save him. This never would’ve happened. He grips the key. 

Faintly, Spider-Man waves at him through the fog. “It’s going to be okay.”

Words failing him, Miles reluctantly does what he’s told, and leaves him behind.

* * *

And when Kingpin picks up Spider-Man with his bare hands and drives him into the ground, bones snapping, Tombstone laughing — _this isn’t right, this can’t be happening_ — Miles can do nothing but stare in horror. If he hadn’t been here, if he had said something better, convinced him to get up, come with, maybe if he had just picked Spider-Man up and ran home…

He grips the key. Backing up slowly, he nudges into a metal railing. The thwang reverberates —

A voice below rumbles. “What was that?”

He runs.


	2. Chapter 2

Peter’s first conscious thought is one of both tempered annoyance and grudging gratitude. At least his latest kidnapper had the courtesy to tie him up some place out of the cold. 

As far as abductions go, at least he’s right side up this time. And not underwater. Feeling the restraints, what alarms him most is the open air: before he opens his aching eyes, he registers that the mask is off. That’s happened before, though it’s never a good sign. His typical enemies enjoy waiting until he’s awake just to see him squirm, forcing him to sit through some song and dance before making a show of taking the thing off — a plan which he inevitably ruins with his own getaway. Removing it before he's even conscious almost always means they’re not interested in wasting time.

God. His left nostril is clogged. Blood. And at least one black eye. Probably a mild concussion too. 

An invisible pulse shimmers through the air. All energy in the room centers somewhere in front of him, every sense aimed at someone that looks mighty familiar as he cracks his eyes open, and — 

“You’re like me,” Peter says, or tries to, because it comes out more like “Yur luh” before he breaks into a sneeze. He groans. It does nothing now to help his headache. Mother, he feels like he’s been run over by a bus. In which he regrettably has had first-hand experience. 

It all comes rushing back. The graveyard, the train, the tilt-a-whirl ride that had dragged and swung and smacked him across Lower Manhattan like a tin can trailing from the bumper of a honeymoon car. 

He slurs, “Di’you electrocute me…?” 

“Sorry,” the hazy figure says. It’s a young voice. Male. 

Peter squints in the dim light. The lucky cat on the counter to his left waves invitingly. The vertigo makes him nauseous. 

“I mean — ” The kid clears his throat and adopts a deep voice. “I got some questions.” 

The figure crosses his arms. Peter’s eye catches onto the familiar colors of his outfit. Is that — ? 

His stomach sinks. Of course. 

“Well this is cute,” Peter grunts. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d been caught by an enthusiastic fan, though it’s the first time he’s met one with superpowers of their own. The kid might have been sitting at some kind of vigil to mourn his old idol; of course he would pounce on a lookalike wearing the same costume. Great going, Peter. Why had he gone to the graveyard again? 

With a monumental effort, he strains against the bindings. His feet swing and the room begins to sway; apparently he’s tied to a very large punching bag. God, his legs are tied tight — that’ll be a problem. Grunting, he tries to move his wrists first. They aren’t budging. The cords are squeezed around his forearms so painfully he might be losing circulation. 

None of his aches and pains are bad enough to suggest serious injuries, or at least none that would put him at a real disadvantage once he breaks out of this thing. The super healing would clear everything up within an hour or two. But he’ll be long gone by then. 

Or he _plans_ to be, if he can _just — get — to_ — 

Peter gives up fighting the bindings when the punching bag makes a complete one-eighty and, panting, he is forced to admit he has made no progress. He’s now staring at a dark, unfamiliar bachelor pad. The window on the other side of the room looks like his most likely avenue of eventual escape, which he reluctantly files away for later. His head is spinning worse than ever; he leans it back against the nylon carefully, feeling vaguely like he might throw up. He pants. “This is less cute.” 

“Who are you?” 

Peter snorts, trying to clear out the blood caught in his left nostril. 

“Why do you look like Peter Parker?” the stranger tries again. 

Toes barely touching the floor, Peter grunts and swings his way back around to face his assaulter. “Because I am Peter Parker.” 

“Peter Parker’s dead,” the kid says defiantly. “You must be a brother or something.” 

“Peter Parker doesn’t have any brothers.” This is getting him nowhere. He scans the walls for stable webbing spots, but this place is full of junk, paraphernalia on the wall, too many breakable things. Pausing, he realizes what he’d just said and corrects: “I. _I_ don’t have any brothers.” 

“If you’re him then why’re you so much older?” the kid continues. “And your hair’s brown. And why is the rest of you — uh — not like the other guy apart from the face?” 

Whatever that means. 

“Like your body,” the kid continues. He immediately clamps his mouth shut. 

Peter rolls his eyes. In the past twenty-four hours he’s been tossed into a wormhole, thrown against a Times Square billboard, electrocuted, ridden the S train from hell, and now some preteen is calling him fat. Somehow that last one smarts the most. “We’re off to a great start in this relationship, pal.” 

“No, like, I just meant — ” 

“You don’t look so hot either, kid. Most superheroes don’t wear their own merch.” The bag starts to swing again. Peter is surprised to find the space to wiggle two fingers; if he can free his wrist enough to move, his webs aren’t far behind. Just keep the kid talking. 

“This isn’t — I mean, I’m not — ” He clears his throat. The deep voice is back. “I’m asking the questions, here.” 

Amused, Peter thumps his head against the bag. Three fingers of his left hand are finally free. “Go on then.” 

“Are you a ghost?” 

“Sure,” Peter grouses, unable to help himself, “that explains why you were able to _tie me down with rope_.” 

“Are you a zombie?” 

“Because zombies are known for their ability to hold a conversation?” 

This continues for a few blessed minutes, allowing Peter enough time to gather his bearings. The kid — Peter has decided to call him Squirt — removes his mask and begins to follow the bag’s rotations, tossing theories at him with more curiosity than suspicion. This is starting to feel less like an attempted interrogation and more like a very bewildering game of Twenty Questions. Squirt clearly knows nothing, and is under the impression that _Peter_ must know something. God knows how he came to that conclusion. 

The truth is that Peter has a very discomforting thought in his head telling him that he knows exactly what’s going on. He wants to be wrong. Holes in his ceiling and strange billboards could be explained by… oh, anything, hallucinogens or his own loss of sanity being the most likely options — but neither really explains a mass delusion of the entirety of New York mourning a dead, blonde doppelganger with his own gravestone. A dead, blonde doppelganger that was, as far as he can tell, reliving his own life from circa ten years ago. At least until yesterday evening when he bit the bullet. Twenty-four hours and counting of this mass hallucination, and it showed no sign of wearing off. 

“Are you a clone?” 

“What do you think.” 

“Are you Peter Parker from the future?” 

Peter sighs. “Getting warmer.” 

“Did you come out of the explosion?” 

“The what?” 

Squirt pays him no mind. He seems to have hit upon an idea. “Are you from an alternate dimension? Like a parallel universe where things are like this universe but different, and you’re Spider-Man — ” He talks quicker and quicker, hands gesturing. “ — and you somehow traveled to _this_ universe — but you don’t know how?” 

Peter raises his brows, considering. “That was not a guess. You’ve been sitting on that one.” 

“We learned about it in Physics,” the kid says breathlessly. He’s watching Peter with something like awe. “So you’re really from an another dimension?” 

“It seems so.” 

“That’s why you’ve got the — the thing.” He points to his head. “The same thing the other Peter Parker had. The mind-connection.” 

Peter stares at him; then he remembers his nerves going haywire on awakening. “You’ve got the sense?” 

“Is that what this is called?” 

“It’s not called anything, it just is what it is. I call it the Spidey-Sense when I need to fancy it up.” 

Squirt wrinkles his nose in judgment. For a supposed fan, he doesn’t seem appropriately awed anymore by the fact that he has Spider-Man tied up in his room like boar on a spit. “ _That’s_ what you named it?” 

“I was bit by a spider, I run around in a suit with a spider logo stamped on the front, and I call myself Spider-Man. I never said I was creative.” 

“Are there two Spider-Men where you come from?” The question spills out urgently, shocking Peter. “Like — have you ever met anyone else?” 

Peter eyes him. “No. First time I’ve had the pleasure.” 

And man is it disorienting. All things considered, meeting someone else with spider-powers is hardly the most impossible thing that had happened to him this week — but it is, somehow, the worst thing he’s run up against so far in this strange new world, worse than waking up in a fan’s bedroom. Part of him, buried deep, is wondering how the kid came into his powers, but it’s the same type of sick curiosity one might poke at roadkill lying by the side of the highway. The questions are on the tip of his tongue. 

_How did you_ — Probably the exact same way you did, Pete. A spider, a bite. Shazam. 

_How old are —_ Younger than you were. Just look at him. 

_What the hell are you thinking?_ — That sums it up, really. Just a big fat “Why bother?” Kid must be a fan, must have seen the real deal and been hit with a serious case of hero-worship. How could he not, with Adonis Blondie at the wheel. And now, Peter realizes this with an uncomfortable sickening feeling, now he’s latching onto him. Plan B, conveniently arriving just in time to replace Spidey 1.0. 

None of this matters. What matters is that Peter needs to get home. And needs to stamp out that little light of anticipation before it gains any real traction. 

“Did you meet the other Peter?” Squirt catches himself. “Wait, no — you _must’ve_ come in the explosion. So you couldn’t have. But you’re here now. And — ” His eyes light up, snapping back onto Peter. “You can teach me!” 

Oh Christ. “I can what now?” 

“You can show me how to do this, teach me to be Spider-Man! The other Peter said he would, but then — ” 

“ — Then he died.” 

“Yeah,” the kid says breathlessly. He dials back a bit, embarrassed by his enthusiasm. “Yeah. I guess you saw that on the news. But I need to learn. I need to do what Peter — Mr. Parker — the other Spider-Man meant to do.” 

“Let me guess,” Peter interrupts. A scene becoming of a Hollywood tragedy appears in his mind’s eye: the old guy artfully draped on the ground, passing the torch to this kid in his final moments, _don’t let me down, they’re all counting on you_. Classic. It’s not what he would’ve done, but then, he wasn’t twenty-six and hopeful anymore. “He wanted you to take up the mantle. Finish what he couldn’t. He made you promise.” 

“…Yeah. How’d you know?” 

“Lucky guess. Sorry about this, by the way.” 

“Sorr — what?” 

The cords fall to the ground and Peter kicks the bag back; it swings like a lead pendulum, knocking Squirt hard into a closet door. Dimly, Peter registers that the kid’s sense didn’t alert him in time to dodge it. Only proving his point about lost causes, really. 

“Lesson number one.” Peter grunts, stretching his legs, rolling his wrists. At least his nose has cleared up and the nausea disappeared. “Don’t watch the mouth, watch the hands.” 

“Peter, seriously — ” 

A palmful of webbing solves that problem. Peter strolls over to open the window and a faceful of cold air greets him. 

Behind him are the familiar sounds of someone grunting, struggling to free themselves of the webbing. Peter hesitates, one foot on the windowsill. Was that too much? Probably. He should’ve used that ‘watch the hands’ line while he was still tied up. _Ahhh_ , he used to be so much better at this kind of thing. Blame the concussion. 

_How do you always have the right joke at the right moment? You never suffer from staircase wit like the rest of us mortals?_

_Not really. I have tons of jokes that don’t land. I just say stuff, doesn’t matter if it sounds dumb._

_True. You’re already running around in a goofy costume, why filter anything that comes out of that gumball machine head of yours?_

_MJ…!_

Peter swallows. 

“Trust me, kid. This’ll all make you a better Spider-Man.” 

Peter climbs onto the fire escape railing and takes off, wondering if it would have been kinder to act like a complete asshole instead. Keep the kid from getting any bright ideas. He feels pretty confident that the overall tone that has been established is one of _Don’t bother following me_. But he always had a strange, inconsistent soft spot for kids, especially kids who looked up to the mask, which was where the trouble had started, wasn’t it, because it gave MJ hope, and then — 

An overwhelming cacophony of white noise clamors in his ears, disorienting him. The webbing goes wide. Pain hits a second later: every molecule of skin feels like fizzing Mentos in a coke, his stomach is constricting on itself, his throat and mouth have switched places altogether. Peter’s aware he’s screaming in midair, falling, until — 

THUD, he lands on something cold. Metal grating. Peter curls, groaning loudly — his throat feels solid enough for that now. He’s vaguely aware of his arm disappearing then reappearing half a second later, tingling painfully like he’s ripped every follicle of skin off. He clutches at that shoulder with his other shaking hand. He’d smacked his head on something on the way down. 

“Woah,” a voice says from above. The kid got the webbing off. “I can’t see you. Are you okay?” 

Peter groans. His left leg is being poked with hot needles. 

A beat. “I said, are you okay?” 

“No,” Peter snaps, “no, I’m not.” 

“What just happened? Should I call someone?” 

Jesus. As the white noise fades in his ears, his goal of _get home_ updates to _get home ASAP_. “I don’t think my atoms are real jazzed about being in the wrong dimension.” 

Another cacophony of disorienting, gut-twisting pain, this time unaccompanied by the noise. Still curled up, Peter sees his hand disappear from his wrist, senses it within his gut instead, feels it snap back to his arm before he can react. His right leg breaks and heals again in an instant. His head is pounding, spidey-sense is going haywire, unable to keep up. 

Once he feels stable, Peter groans and manages to push up to his knees, leaning against the fire escape railing, panting. Cold air fills his lungs. “I’m not looking for some… some Career Day side gig as a Spider-Man coach, okay?” 

Clanking from above. The kid is descending down the stairs. “I didn’t ask for this either! I need help, okay? That’s why I was at his graveyard earlier. I can’t do this alone. But Peter Parker can, I think you’re here to help me! So, just — could you — ?” 

The headache is back. Peter rubs at his face, feeling every second of his thirty-whatever years centered entirely in the bags of his eyes. He thinks he might hurl. “Look, I’ve got a lot going on in my dimension, okay? Sorry you lost your guy. But you can do it, look, you lugged a grown man across Brooklyn and tied him up all on your own.” He cracks his back, but it doesn’t seem to help; since he broke it three years ago he’s been starting to think his spine will never feel right again. “Or just find someone else, y’know, Spider-Men are apparently a dime a dozen around here.” 

“ _You’re_ Spider-Man! You can’t just go!” More clanking. Squirt is one level above him now. “With great power comes great — ” 

“ _Don’t_ finish that sentence, just stop you there before I really throw up.” Peter snaps, climbing back onto the railing. He thwips for the building across the way — 

AGAIN! 

Peter does scream this time, or he thinks he does. Though this pain fades quicker, it knocks him off-kilter for longer. He barely grabs hold of another railing further down before he can crash on top of the car parked on the ground below. 

His bare hand smarts against the cold railing. Peter breaths, and hangs there for a moment. Okay. Getting home was now priority Alpha, All-Hands-On-Deck. Fuck. If this seizure thing happens again when he’s in combat or somewhere in public — 

“You want my advice.” Peter spits out something clogging his throat. Blood. It falls the few remaining stories to land in the alley below. “Go back to being a regular kid.” 

The boy’s voice above sounds desperate, which is familiar, but angry, which is new. “I already told you, I can’t! Kingpin’s got a supercollider, and assassins, and he’s trying to — !” 

“ _What_ was that?” Peter steps up on the brick wall. “You never said — a supercollider? The interdimensional kind?” 

“I guess — I mean, I think so, what does that matter?” 

“Oh, let’s just watch Peter’s guts and face rearrange themselves because he’s trapped in the wrong universe and let’s not tell him how he can get home,” he snaps, which might be a little unfair, but goddammit. “Where is it?” 

“No!” Eyes narrowed, Squirt leans further over the railing. “No, why should I tell you? You’ll just run off and leave me here. We need to shut it down together or we’re _all_ at risk.” 

“Kingpin, you said? Fisk? He still got his evil lairs in Manhattan?” 

“Brooklyn.” His young friend suddenly smirks. He’s halfway onto the brick, following Peter down the wall but still grasping the railing as a lifeline. “But you can’t use the collider anyway. You _need_ me.” 

Peter steps off the wall and lands on the silver Camry below. “Oh?” 

“Yeah, cause _I’ve_ got the key to control it.” And then, bless him, he actually _shows it off_. 

“Ah, you’ve got a goober. Give it.” 

“No, it’s an _override key_. He said I’ll need it to — ” 

“To shut down the big monster machine or save the world or cure swine flu, yeah, I know. There’s always a bypass key, an override key, a who-cares-I-can-never-remember key, so I just call it a goober.” Peter gestures with his hand again. “Give it.” 

“What’re you gonna do with it?” the kid demands. “Just plug it in and jump into the portal? Someone should shut it down after you go. You need a plan! We should _team up_.” 

“I’ve been doing this alone for a while, kid, I really don’t need _your_ help.” 

For the first time, Peter sees a flash of hurt in his face. Ah, dammit. This is why he’d walked away. Why he’d said no, why — 

Squirt stuffs the goober in his mouth. 

Peter narrows his eyes. “Don’t test me.” 

“Ow swallow it, don’t pllay wi me,” Squirt says around a mouthful of USB. 

“What?” 

“I sai — HEY!” 

Peter thumbs the drive with one hand and jumps to the brick building across the alley with his other. The glitching sensation from earlier has completely passed, and cold air is clearing his head, strangely helping him concentrate. He feels back in his element. 

“I’ll put this thing in and get outta your hair,” he calls. “Have a good one.” 

“No, it’s — stop, I can’t walk that fast!” 

Peter pauses, thumb still investigating the USB, but something feels off. He squints at it in the dark. Is that an exposed wire? 

“I need to turn the collider off after you leave, or else — ” 

If this thing is broken, he’s SOL. He’s more than that, he’s a seizuring SOL smeared on the sidewalk and no way of getting back home. 

Peter turns around. The kid is halfway down the wall behind him, clinging tentatively to the brick. Peter brandishes the goober at him. “Is this your handiwork?” 

“No, the sidewalk did it,” he says sarcastically. “Look, okay, I was still learning. _Am_ still learning. Cut me some slack here.” 

Peter works his jaw.

Do not blow up at a child. You’re better than that.

After a second of contemplation, he holds the goober out and lets go. It falls at a straight ninety-degree angle. Yelping below him, the kid catches it. 

“Wait!” 

Peter turns back up the wall, silently fuming. Step one: figure out wherever the hell Alchemax is in this universe; step two: break in, download the schematics for the collider; step three: make some magic and find a way to manufacture another one of those stupid things; step four: get the hell out of dodge. 

He’d had more impossible to do lists. 

“Go home, Spidey Junior, I’m serious.” 

“I made a promise!” the boy yells behind him. “If I don’t turn the collider off after you leave, everyone in the city — ” Squirt yelps (Peter envisions him slipping down the building) and continues, “my parents, my uncle, my friends, everyone in this city is gonna die, or get sucked into a wormhole — and you’re just leaving? You’re-you’re just leaving me alone here to figure all this out myself?” Desperate: “You, _Spider-Man_ , you’re good with that?” 

Peter stops again reluctantly. Turns. Looks down at this kid, this boy dressed in a sad, ill-fitting Halloween costume, wide eyed, and all he sees is a disaster in the making.

Too young. Be the responsible one.

This is exactly why he never did it. This is why he was right, he had been _so right_ , except there’s no MJ to see it now, no Aunt May to listen and show him how to be a guiding figure to a young kid with a world of responsibility on his shoulders. 

If you had the chance to stop it from happening to you, wouldn’t you take it? 

“Yeah,” Peter says now, and if it sounds cruel, then he’ll live with it. He’s lived with himself this far already. 

So he turns away and walks over the side. 

...And makes it five steps before a lightning bolt of pain hits every nerve in his system. His vision goes haywire, the droning static overwhelming his ears. When he comes to, he’s lying on the rooftop, face smashed against cold concrete. 

Peter gags, spits up a bit. Disgusting. 

He rubs at his face. All right. Never let it be said Peter Parker can’t take a hint from the universe. 

He pushes himself to sit, leaning back on his palms. The concrete is freezing. Above him, the sky is clear. It looks like New York and feels like New York… if he closes his eyes he can imagine it’s any other rooftop back home. Distantly, he sees stars, which is a marvel; has he ever seen stars within a fifty-mile radius of the city? Does light pollution work differently here, or has he found some miraculous world that survives on green energy? Everything about this place is wrong. He misses his stupid, filthy city with garbage piled up on the sidewalks and those puddles of sewage trapped on street corners that never seemed to drain anywhere. He misses his terrible studio. He misses home. 

…No, he doesn’t. Home is a shitshow. He doesn’t miss any of it, but it’s familiar. Better the devil you know and all that. 

Peter sighs. 

What would he have wanted, back when he was fifteen and stupid? If he had miraculously met someone who could answer his questions… what would he have asked for? What would he have needed? 

He wouldn’t have asked for someone like himself. The kid had got his hopes up with Captain Boy Scout, probably daydreaming of web-swinging and crime-fighting around the city with his idol. Jesus. 

It’d be unkind to leave him here. Worse to get his hopes up. Pop the bubble now: the idyllic superhero lifestyle doesn’t exist. You do not get to save the cake and eat it too. Eventually you give up one life for the other. You have to. 

This other Peter Parker… knowing his last moment had come, put his faith in this kid. His final card, his ace in the hole. He had seen something trustworthy in this boy in his last moments. Had it been trust, or desperation? Did it matter? He was gone. He couldn’t ask him. 

And the kid. Committed to a promise to a dead man. It’s such a disgustingly Spider-Man thing to do, he wants to roll his eyes on principle.

Everyone in this city is gonna die.

It isn’t his New York, but it is New York. It’s enough New York for the blonde guy to die over. 

He needs to go home. The kid belongs here. Peter goes home, Squirt shuts off the collider behind him. Squirt fulfills his promise and Peter gets back to wasting his days away in peace. Nobody dies. 

Nobody dies. The important part. The most important. 

Peter sighs and thwips at a nearby water tower to heave to his feet, then turns back to the railing. The kid likely went back to the apartment across the way. He can probab — 

The boy is squatting sideways on the brick wall, head in his hands. Peter can see him shivering from here with those costume sleeves rolled to his elbows. 

This is ridiculous. “What are you _doing_?” 

“Making you feel guilty.” 

Peter feels his lips twitch. “Are you?” 

“Cause it’s just that I’ve never done this before, and the only guy who could help me died,” the kid continues, “and I don’t know what’s going on and Kingpin is trying to kill me…” Yet despite all of it, the boy seems more lively now, lifting his head to count off his fingers. “And now I need a plan D, and I need it fast, cause I don’t know when Kingpin is gonna run the collider again.” 

Plan D? “I’m not even your plan B?” 

“You were plan C,” the kid explains. He looks up at Peter, clear-eyed. Not looking too upset anymore, is he? Peter is uncomfortably aware that he’s losing a battle of wills with a teeanger and this is just dragging out the defeat. “Plan A died and my Plan B isn’t home right now…” 

“Your plan C,” Peter says dryly. “Whoever said being a superhero wouldn’t keep you humble. How did you electrocute me?” 

“What?” 

“In the graveyard. You carry around a taser, or is that one of your powers?” 

“Oh.” His eyes widen. “Oh, yeah, uh, I was wondering if you could tell me that. I just — thought it was a hidden Spider-Man power. Can you not… I mean, is it?” 

Peter stares at him. The kid stares back. 

Peter takes a breath, stuffs his face into his coat sleeve, and yells. It’s long and obnoxious and it feels damn good. 

“All right, kid, you win,” he says when it’s over. “Get up here, craning my neck is giving me a headache.” 

When his new tag-along climbs over the side of the building, panting but looking infinitely more lively, a thought occurs to him. “What’s your name, by the way?” 

“Oh, now you ask,” the kid asks, but he doesn’t sound all that bothered. In fact he sounds quite cheerful; he seems to think he’s holding all the cards. Peter has to admit, someone on his side with a not-having-to-deal-with-interdimensional-seizures card is starting to sound advantageous. 

“Unless you want to get used to ‘hey kid.’” 

“I’m Miles.” 

“All right, Miles. How did you know the other guy? What did he tell you about this collider?” 

“Not much. I met him in Kingpin’s underground lair as he was trying to destroy it. Then it exploded, and…” 

Miles looks around and crosses his arms. He’s still shivering. “Why are we doing this out in the cold?” 

His Spider-Man suit is insulated. That cheap Halloween costume is almost definitely not. “Because I’m an idiot. You have a coat?” 

“It’s back in the living room.” 

Peter scratches his stubble, calculating. For some inexplicable reason the only thing he can think about is that it’s — he glances at his wrist, then wonders why he did that, he hasn’t worn a watch in years — some time past midnight on a school night, and Miles is obviously out past bedtime. Not like he’s one to talk, he used to play hookey whenever it suited him, but… it feels different, somehow, when he’s the adult in the equation. 

He refuses to think about MJ, about how the subject of children had been the straw that broke the camel’s back. That was then; this is now. He isn’t signing on to eighteen years of fatherhood. He just needs to keep a teenager from harm for a day, maybe two at most. Made easier by the fact that the teenager has super-healing, presumably, and he’ll go home a sparkling new and freshly enlightened Spider-Man, all the wiser for having known Peter, or something. All right. Doable. 

Miles, Peter corrects himself. He needs to keep _Miles_ from harm. And in return Miles will get him home and keep him from dying in this universe like a sad, twitching, radioactive cockroach. And somewhere in there they’ll save the universe, or something. Yippee ki yay. 

Peter walks back over to the side of the roof, thwipping to the other building. Halfway across the alley in midair, he has a horrifying thought that he might glitch again — _crashing onto the car below, a car alarm, panicked locals running outside_ — but to his great relief, he make it across and hops over the fire escape railing. Peter climbs back through the open window. 

It takes a minute for the kid to cross the alley again. Peter sighs. Slowing himself down for Miles to follow will take conscious effort. “Whose apartment is this?” he asks when Miles joins him inside. 

“My uncle’s.” 

“Will it be empty for us to talk for a while?” 

Miles closes the window, still shivering. He rubs at his arms and dips under the plant, passing Peter to open the closet door, hunting for warmer layers. “He’s out of town. I wouldn’t have brought you back here if anyone was going to come.” 

“Yeah, while we’re at it, I want to talk about that whole tying me to a punching bag thing.” 

Miles looks over his shoulder guiltily. “Sorry. I saw a dead guy come back to life. I didn’t know what to do.” 

Peter can’t fault him for that. Even to superheroes, that stretches the limits of normal. “Fair enough.” 

“Do you want some of my uncle’s clothes?” On his toes, Miles grunts and pulls out a jacket from the closet. “You’re both tall, you’d probably fit…” 

Peter blinks, not entirely certain how to react to the offer. “No. Thanks.” 

“We should at least do laundry. Your coat smells, uh. Not great.” 

So that’s what this was about. Considering Peter had fished the coat out of the Hudson, he’s not surprised that it smells. (The sweatpants, at least, had been found on dry land.) Before he can reply, Miles continues: 

“You should have some sturdier shoes but Uncle Aaron would kill me if I gave you any of his, so. Sorry.” 

“I’ll live. This coat’s not in the best shape, but people have been keeping their distance, so I’m fine with it. We shouldn’t stay here too long anyway.” 

“We shouldn’t?” 

Peter, thinking of the seizures, said, “No. I don’t want to waste time.” He glances around, reluctant to leave any trace of his presence inside a stranger’s apartment, but his legs ache something awful. Advanced healing aside, his body hasn’t yet forgotten the train ride. With much internal dilemma, he takes the coat off and sinks down onto the couch, sighing in relief. At least if he spasms again it’ll be on a comfortable surface. 

“Are we going to go to Alchemax?” Miles pulls the USB out and squints at it. “They made the collider. And it’s one of Fisk’s companies. I’m sure we can find something there to make a new one of these.” 

Peter leans his head back against the sofa. “Your guy probably snuck into their HQ. If he can do it, we can. It’ll be fine. Just give me a chance to catch my breath.” 

“Okay. We can just stay here tonight and go in the morning, you know. My uncle won’t mind.” 

“You don’t live here, do you?” 

“No.” 

“Your parents aren’t going to wonder where you’re gone?” 

“No.” 

Peter raises an eyebrow. 

“I go to a charter school across town. I see them on weekends.” 

Peter yelps as another seizure hits. He clutches his chest as it fades, heart hammering, breath coming in bursts. 

“Do you want water or something?” Miles says, eyes wide. 

“I’m fine.” 

“Seriously.” 

“I’m _fine_.” Peter closes his eyes, head against the couch, and breathes. In, out. In, out. His lungs burn. 

He hears shuffling, and a door opening in the hallway. After a minute, Miles says tentatively from across the room, “I really think we should stay here tonight, man.” 

Peter exhales through his nose. Privately he agrees, but practicality is warring with impatience. These seizures are only making his exhaustion worse and vice versa. If they’re going to break into Alchemax, they should at least do it with a full night’s rest. Miles can’t go in himself, and it’d do them no good for him to spazz in the middle of a heist. 

He opens his eyes. Miles is standing in the middle of the living room carrying a folded blanket, watching him. 

Something in Peter clenches. “You’re sure your uncle wouldn’t mind?” 

“Yeah. He’s cool.” 

Peter scrubs at his eyes. “Okay. All right, we stay tonight, and then first thing tomorrow, come up with a plan.” 

Miles puts the blanket on the coffee table cautiously, like he’s afraid of scaring Peter off. “How will we make a new USB?” 

“I’ll figure it out,” Peter says around a yawn, closing his eyes and rolling to face the back of the couch. “If it’s alright with you I’m gonna pass out now. Had a long day of getting my ass kicked. Need my beauty sleep.” 

“Okay,” Miles says. “Um. Night, I guess.” 

Peter sighs. “Night.” He waits, half expecting more questions or discussion, but Miles seems to take the hint. After a few minutes of silence, the light turns off, and eventually, he hears the soft click of a bedroom door. Uncomfortably aware that he mishandled something tonight, but not willing to dwell on it, his exhaustion finally carries him to sleep. 

* * *

Peter stirs hours later to the sound of movement. Someone is shuffling near the television. He rolls over and sees a figure leaning over to grab the green coat he had left bundled on the coffee table. 

“I’m not gonna run in the middle of the night, kid.” 

“I know,” Miles says quietly. “I’m just washing your coat. Um. It really smells, dude.” 

Peter rubs at an eye. Across the room, blinking lights under the television set make out fuzzy numbers, but he can’t read them. “What time is it?” 

“Six.” 

“Alright,” he says around a yawn. He feels better already: clear-headed and more present, in the moment. Also starving. “Put it in and go back to sleep. I’ll get it out and wake you. Let’s be out of here by seven, seven-thirty.” 

Peter dozes for another hour or so. The sun isn’t up yet but he can hear cars in the distance already. This used to be his favorite time of morning, when he was young and energized enough to make use of the full day. But as the years passed, being awake before sunrise usually meant he had stayed out late again to avoid his wife and their cold bed. A year into living without her, he still can’t shake the associating feeling of loneliness at this time of morning. It’s the start of another morning without someone to start it with, without someone to share his meals and life and heart with, without someone to give a single thought about what will happen to him today. 

Miles yawns loudly in the other room.

All right. Get your head out of your ass, Parker.

Peter reluctantly stands, stretching himself fully awake. He’s struck by an unpleasant smell, and realizes it’s himself. The suit always feels clingy and sticky after he sleeps in it, and he’s been wearing it for at nearly two days straight. He’s unpleasantly reminded of the fact that he hadn’t washed it back home in at least a week. And hasn’t showered in… uh. Three days? Shit. 

This side of morning, Peter realizes Miles had been quite polite last night: he smells absolutely rank. He wonders if he might brush his teeth or quickly run his hair under a faucet, at the very least. Both are desperately missing a wash. 

“Oh you’re up.” 

Miles is a dark figure in the doorway to the bedroom. He takes a few steps to turn the kitchen lights on. Half of the apartment is bathed in cool fluorescent lighting. 

“I’ll take the coat out,” Peter says, getting up. “You go back to sleep.” 

“It’s okay,” Miles says. Then, after a moment, “I didn’t sleep well anyway.” 

Peter raises an eyebrow. “Too excited?” 

Miles shrugs and avoids his eyes. He goes over to the hallway closet and slides the door open to reveal a washer-dryer sandwiched under cluttered shelves. 

Miles might as well have opened it to reveal a hot tub. This kid’s uncle has his own washing unit in a single-occupancy one-bedroom apartment? Peter eyes the rest of the apartment with a new series of questions popping up in his head, while the boy stands on his toes to lean into the dryer, pulling out the huge green coat. 

“Still kind of damp.” Miles frowns but hands it over. 

Peter tries not to look like he was staring. “It’ll dry. Thank you.” 

“If you want, the bathroom’s just there.” Miles points and looks somewhat embarrassed. “I was gonna say that last night but you were tired so… You can uh, use the towels if you want to shower, they’re just washed.” 

Peter feels strangely guilty over the charity, but he can’t afford to turn it down. “Thanks, kid.” 

In the bathroom, he wrestles with the ethics of using a stranger’s personal facilities without their knowledge before giving up and stripping. He smells foul, and they’re about to do some serious Spider-Manning. Get in quickly, get out quickly. 

Once washed, he brushes his teeth with his index finger and the smallest glob of toothpaste he can get away with. He’s reluctant to step back into the sweaty suit, but there’s nothing else for it. The pants, at least, are holding up, and surprisingly so are the shoes, though his feet certainly didn’t thank him yesterday for not acquiring any socks to insulate against the December chill. 

Peter towels off his hair quickly and steps back into the hallway, tossing it into the hamper in the closet. For all that he’s wearing the exact same clothes, he feels the best he has in days. Miles isn’t in the living room, so he knocks on the bedroom door. It swings open. 

Miles is lying over the duvet, fully dressed and staring at a remote in his hand. The mattress head whirs as it dips up and down, rhythmic. The kid glances up and spots him, shoving the remote onto the bedside table and jumping down. He looks embarrassed. “Ready.” 

Peter elects to ignore it. “All right. Let’s get a bite to eat on the way over.” 

“We could have breakfast here.” 

Uneasy at further taking advantage of this stranger’s unwitting hospitality, Peter replies, “If it’s all the same to you I’d rather not. Let’s get going.” 

Miles pulls up a backpack from the side of the bed. It looks full to bursting. 

“Nuh-uh,” Peter says. Unable to help himself, he reaches toward the bag, prompting Miles to clutch it closer. “We travel light. Rule one.” Frowning, he remembers last night. “Rule two, actually.” 

“But what if we need — ” 

“I’ve survived off of web shooters and wits for twenty years, we’ll be fine.” 

Miles stares. 

“What?” 

“ _Twenty years_?” He catches himself. “I mean, I figured it was a long time but — how old _are_ you?” 

Peter can practically feel the bags under his eyes returning as he stares down Miles’s youth in the face. He exhales. “Bring the backpack if you want, but whatever’s in it, you’re carrying it there and back. Let’s go.” 

On the way out the door, Peter turns off the kitchen light, making sure everything is the way he found it before exiting, and Miles says in a pathetic attempt to be sly, “The other Peter was twenty-six, I think.” 

“I am not twenty-six.” 

“Well yeah,” Miles says impatiently, locking the door behind them, “but I thought, maybe you’re just, uh…  prematurely gray?” He says the last bit the same way he had said _your body is different_ last night, like someone afraid to offend. 

Peter leads the way down the hall. “You knew I was older than your guy. Why are you surprised?” 

“I dunno. Twenty years is older than I am. So that means…” Miles does some mental math. His eyes widen. “You’re probably like my _dad’s age_. No wonder you don’t wanna tell me.” 

He’s not old enough to have a preteen son. That rankles. “Thirty-smthnsmthn.” He purposefully mumbles the last bit as he jams the button for the elevator. “You happy now?” 

“Yes,” Miles replies, and smugly follows him inside the lift when it comes. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Laundry machines are rare commodity inside NYC apartments. There might be machines for use in the basement, but most people need to go to laundromats. In the film, Peter moves into a cramped studio after splitting from MJ, and Aaron has a very stylish, clearly well-funded one-bedroom in Brooklyn. The devs also mentioned Aaron gifted Miles his Jordans, so I figure Aaron might be in a position to treat himself to small luxuries. Peter would probably have to use a laundromat like most people that don't live in burbs, which is why Aaron's appliances are notable to him.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 2019 has been kind of a difficult year for me, but I wanted to complete as much of this fic as I could before it ended. I'll settle for (finally!) finishing Chapter 3. Happy New Year everyone!

Thirty-four hours earlier, Peter’s first item of business following his unceremonious crash landing in Times Square — after collecting his jaw from the ground and fighting off tourists that wanted a picture, that is — had been to find a map. He waited for a family of six to conclude their business at the tourist kiosk then grabbed an annoying fold-out map, a decision which pained the local New Yorker within him to the core. He snagged a space to sit on the blue TKTS stairs (blue, they’re _blue_ here, not red, this place is nuts) and sat down to study it, feeling very much like he was back in second grade geography, relearning his city like a grade schooler on a field trip.

Peter knows his New York well (all the boroughs and a fair amount of upstate, thank you) but there are just enough differences here to throw him off his game. The Chrysler and Empire State Buildings have switched addresses. Roosevelt Island doesn’t exist. The classic yellow taxis are green, which isn’t that big a deal but honestly, yeah it is.

Now after two days of scrounging around hunting for food, clothing, and answers, Peter feels a little more confident: he can handle misspelled street signs, and some locations are identical to the city back home. Yet as he strolls up Benson with Miles, several avenues make him double-take, ones that he knows for a fact belong in Staten Island with the rest of the heathens. 

For these reasons he lets Miles take the lead to the Benson Ave subway, and tries not to look like what he is: an out of place, unshaven adult man following a young boy down the street.

“Where is Alchemax in your universe?” Miles asks him.

“Midtown.” Peter scans the road, looking for anything that’s open at seven in the morning and serves hot food. “You got an Ess-a-Bagel around here?”

“A what?”

“Nevermind, you’d know it.”

“Uhhh, oh. You mean the deli chain? Nosh-a-Knish?”

Peter snorts. Okay, sure. Alternate universe.

“There’s one in the other direction,” Miles says, “but there’s a diner near the subway, or we can get something at Penn Station…” and Peter stops listening because he’s just seen the most beautiful sight in the world.

“Oh.” He jogs a bit further, and yes, the beautiful red OPEN sign is flickering in the window. “Oh oh oh oh oh. Krysoulas, I have _missed_ you.”

“What — this doesn’t have breakfast!” Miles calls behind him.

“It’s better.” Peter holds the door open and jerks his head in. Miles rolls his eyes, the attitude of the unenlightened. “We’re having two burgers with the tzatziki. Trust me, you’ll like it.” He pauses before following Miles in. “You have cash on you, right?”

* * *

Miles does not, in fact, have cash on him, but he does have a debit card “in case of emergencies.” Peter would’ve offered to pay, really, but even if he could’ve, who’s to say his money would have the same value here? The same treasury signatures? The same watermarks? Better to avoid the issue entirely. Even if he does now owe a teenager thirty dollars he has no way of paying back.

Miles gets his attention as they leave the joint. “The cashier gave me a look,” he says. “Maybe you should swipe my card for anything else we get, cause, y’know. You’re the adult?”

Peter thought it over. “I don’t think they’ll believe my last name is Morales.” Plus card fraud was not exactly on his to-do list. 

“Well I can’t get in trouble buying tons of stuff. My dad will find out when he gets the bank statement, and he’s a cop, so I can’t exactly say someone stole it.”

Miles agrees to take cash out at an ATM for any future purchases, inspiring Peter to impart Spider-Man lesson number three as they catch the train to Manhattan: no cards.

“Make any superhero purchases you need in cash,” he explains, rolling a crick in his neck. “I’ve stopped spending while I’m in the suit, but a few twenties can come in handy.” The subway is mostly clear, except for someone huddled up in a sleeping bundle of coats and scarves at the rear of the car. They’re far enough to be out of range, but Peter keeps his voice low anyway.

Miles looks skeptical but curious. “What kinda stuff do you need to buy when you’re crime-fighting? It’s not like you have pockets.”

“MetroCards, mostly. It gets tiring swinging everywhere. Also sometimes people need ‘em to get home.” Peter pauses as the doors open to allow a group of passengers to enter. They’ve passed under the river and are in the city proper now. Knowing the train is only going to get busier for the rest of the trip, he makes a shushing motion. 

Miles apparently interprets his message as _be discreet_ instead of _be quiet_.

“What’s it made of?” Miles whispers.

“What?”

“The — you know what.” Miles makes a gesture with his hands. Peter frowns. Miles makes the gesture again, like one hand is spraying from the other at the wrist. Is he trying to say web-fluid?

Irritated, Peter shakes his head once. _Not here_ , he mouths.

Miles looks frustrated but relents, stuffing his hands in his jacket and slouching against the seat. Something in his backpack crunches. An older woman is looking at them a little too curiously across the way.

* * *

Peter manages to realign his mental map at Penn Station as they tromp up the stairs and exit the subway. This, thank god, looks like the train station he knows, or at least the recognizable bits — info booth, departure and arrival boards, escalators — seem to be match the station he knows.

Miles moves toward to the Amtrak kiosks, or whatever the train equivalent is in this place. Peter grabs the hood of his jack, shakes his head, and points toward the bus ticket lines.

“Why?”

Peter sighs. “You need to give your name for a train ticket, and I’d rather not have mine say Peter Parker when the guy just died two days ago. Plus the bus is cheaper.”

“Yeah but the train’s faster — ” 

“Look, it’s nine AM. Would you just do me this favor? I’ll get you ice cream or something later.”

Miles sends him a nasty look. “I’m fourteen,” he says coldly, “not six.” Before Peter can reply he yanks out of his grip and stalks off to the ticket booth.

An uncomfortably familiar feeling of not-quite-guilt stuns him into inactivity for a few moments.

Whatever.

Scrubbing the back of his head, Peter looks around for something to do. He snags a map from the tourist booth to make up for the one he had lost on the train ride and attempts to look busy leaning against a support column. He tries memorizing the metro lines, gives it up once again, and flips to the bus schedules on the other side. None of the bus lines north seem to stop in the general vicinity of Alchemax Labs: the campus is located in Kingston, which usually ranks in the Top Five on an average New Yorker’s weekend getaway list back home. But in this reality, the city has relocated thirty miles eastward, and the type for the town is so small that it seems to have barely squeezed its way onto the map. The closest stop he can find drops off in Poughkeepsie, and for further trips outward, he is recommended to check with local buses at the station after drop-off. _Another_ thirty to forty minute ride, at least. Peter sighs and weighs his options. Miles might be getting a swinging lesson after all.

Peter yawns and looks for an empty bit of wall to lean against and rest his eyes. He hadn’t slept well last night, only managing about four hours, but it was more than the night before when he’d curled up on his coat on the roof of a studio in Chinatown. He doesn’t sleep much these days anyway, at least not without his prescription, and it doesn’t help that this universe has added a fun, inter-dimensional seizure surprise to keep him on his toes.

“Here.” Miles is standing in front of him, holding out a Hudson Valley Explorer ticket as he stuffs another one inside his jacket. “The next one leaves at 9:45 at Track 17. We’ll get into Kingston around noon.”

Peter frowns and goes back to his map, then back to the ticket. “I don’t see any — ”

Miles points to the ticket. “This isn’t with the city. It’s a private bus line. It has different routes.”

Peter glances back at the front of his map. _Provided by the City of New York_. Ah.

“I pulled some cash too. Also — ” The kid pulls out a plastic package with a burner phone encased inside. He hands it over.

Peter blinks. “What’s this for?”

Miles looks at him like it’s obvious. “So we can talk. Y’know like in the movies.”

Uhh. Hm. “We won’t need this. We won’t get separated. And if we do, just stay put and I’ll come back to find you.”

Miles looks stunned, and then suddenly embarrassed, and in that instant Peter’s understanding of his behavior reshifts around new clarity: Miles doesn’t just want Peter to be his mentor. Miles wants to be a _team_. Like the other guy might’ve been for him.

“Well — just in case.” Miles avoids Peter’s eyes. Looking around, he spots a convenience store across the way and shuffles off, an obvious attempt to gain some space.

Painfully aware that had been another strike against him, Peter thunks his head back against the brick column. Nice going, Parker. _He’s_ thinking about getting home. The kid’s thinking about saving his universe, and how he’s going to survive after Peter leaves. How, exactly, is he going to squeeze two decades of Spider-Man experience into the time it takes before they destroy the collider?

He has the distinct, uncomfortable feeling that he’s disappointing the kid. Part of him is discontent with that, but the other half is stubborn. Tough shit… What could Peter teach him, anyway? How to perfect superhero-ing at the cost of personal fulfillment and emotional stability? How to look your family in the eye and lie to them for years? How to use your job to avoid coming home when things get hard? How to sabotage every meaningful relationship to make certain they cut ties first, all to avoid admitting out loud that you could no longer be the person they thought you were?

So Miles is just going to have to deal with jokes, the detachment. Anything else is — just too much.

Peter checks the time. They have half an hour to kill before they need to start wandering in the direction of Tracks 15-20. He kills five of those minutes just by trying to open the plastic packaging without scissors, and finally succeeds when he uses his teeth, though he manages to cut his lip a bit. Swearing, he uses the edge of the city map to dab at the blood, then stuffs the map back into his pocket. 

He glances at the convenience store across the way. He can’t see Miles’s head, but he can see the top of that purple backpack moving between shelves.

After another ten minutes of loitering, Peter follows him inside the store. Arriving at noon, arriving at noon… Peter knows his metabolism well enough to factor in the importance of meal times while on missions and stake-outs, which is why he dislikes going out of the city on Spider-Man business unless absolutely necessary. There’s always an open food joint to be found in New York, but the same guarantee couldn’t be held for the burbs. Stocking up isn’t actually a bad idea.

He wanders the aisles for a few minutes, taking in the brand names, trying not to look like a guy desperate enough to paw something. Everything here is junk or snack food — not ideal. He’ll probably need another boost by the time they reach Alchemax, and more after they’re done in the labs. And the kid, did he even eat breakfast this morning? Peter thought back, trying to remember if Miles had eaten anything at the diner, but can’t recall anything beyond sating his own ravenous hunger. He had eaten Miles’s burger too, hadn’t he?

Peter realizes with a jolt that he has been zoning out in front of the refrigerator glass for several minutes. He does a mental shake and frowns. None of this shit looks familiar. Some of it is recognizable: Koca-Soda, Dr. Septer. He scans for Arizona tea, Gatorade, literally anything that’s recognizable and isn’t carbonated. _Monster_ has followed him through the trans-dimensional jump, delightful. 

When Peter opens the fridge door and takes out a bottle of what looks like Sprite, his right hand — disappears. Peter gasps as it glitches in flashes of orange and green, and the plastic bottle smacks on the floor.

A woman on his left startles at the sound and looks to him. Instinctively, Peter flashes a harmless half-smile in her direction. Gritting his teeth, he folds the corner of his coat sleeve over his glitching fingers with his good hand.

She looks away.

Peter puts the bottle back in the row and moves further down the aisle, wanting nothing more now than to just leave and let his atoms dissolve somewhere in private. To avoid walking out with freaking lime water, he grabs a bottle that looks vaguely energy drink-shaped, a small box of energy bars, and, what the hell, a few bananas from the basket next to the cashier too.

He bumps into Miles in front of the magazines. He raises an eyebrow when he sees Peter’s drink of choice.

“That’s the kind of thing kids at school take when they’re doing all-nighters,” Miles says. “Should I get one too?”

Apparently Peter had grabbed this universe’s equivalent of a 5-Hour Energy. Once again, a smack to reality reminds Peter that until this week, Miles’s biggest problems had probably been schoolyard crushes and figuring out the wonders of puberty — and now he was signing up to infiltrate a supervillain lab, blow up a dimensional collider, and keep Peter from seizing to death before he got back home.

The throb of a headache is starting to develop, and now his right hand is pulsing ominously. Peter grips at the edge of his coat sleeve. “Whatever you have is fine.” He hasn’t even looked at what Miles has put onto the conveyor belt — he sees water bottles, batteries, and two USB drives. He’d make fun of the kid for being over prepared if he weren’t so uncomfortably aware of how Miles is a high schooler that Peter is preparing to lead down a road of ethical-but-illegal superhero-sponsored crime.

As they leave, he wrestles with this sudden moral conundrum, aware it’s coming about twelve hours too late. Miles fills the silence with an annoyingly know-it-all sort of tone.

“A guy I know once took two of those at once at nine PM the night before a big test and that drink knocked him out, I’m serious. He doesn’t remember anything that happened to him. He woke up at like eleven AM the next morning in his neighbor’s backyard missing his shoes and had to run to school. I’m just saying, like, be careful.”

Peter smiles despite himself. “Duly noted.”

They follow the signs to the upper garage level. On the escalator, Peter wrestles with his next move, before deciding it’s better safe than sorry with this kind of thing.

“Hey.” Peter hesitates, uncertain how to start this. “I do a lot of infiltrating in this gig. And we’re gonna be sneaking into Alchemax. You understand?”

“Like breaking and entering?”

“Possibly. And beating up some evil scientists, if we’re unlucky enough to get caught.” He raps his knuckles on a strip of wood paneling above the escalator handrail. “ _I_ will handle that. You sit back and enjoy the show. But I need you to understand all this now so we don’t have to get into it later.”

Miles frowns. “Well yeah, they’re bad guys. They’re gonna destroy the multiverse if we don’t stop them.”

Cool, so he won’t have to deal with talking Miles out of the but-doing-illegal-stuff-makes-us-as-bad-as-them thing. Still — “You said your dad’s a cop. Just want to make sure you don’t have any — reservations.”

Apparently that was the wrong thing to say. Miles’s face turns sour and he stuffs his hands in his jacket. “I’m down for it man. I’m not like that.”

“Like what?”

“A _square_.” 

Okay, he hit a nerve. Not his issue, but there’s still the matter of… “You’re not gonna fight me on the other thing, right?”

“What?”

“You staying out of the line of fire.“

Miles looks exasperated. “You won’t have to _save_ me. I know to run and hide if something goes down. I won’t _drag you down_.”

He’s close to snapping back, but something that feels deviously close to a conscious keeps his mouth closed. He might’ve deserved that.

Peter struggles to come up with a more kinder response, but they reach the terminal and join the line for the bus, now surrounded by ears. He exhales, half-wishing for someone standing next to him to catch his eye so that he could make a face that said, _Teenagers, amirite?_

No luck. New York, the city of assholes who mind their own business. 

Miles is silent during the wait to board. As a small white flag, Peter lets him climb aboard first while he deals with their tickets. When he follows, he sees Miles has claimed the row at the very back of the bus, the only one with two spots open together. That was rather kind, all things considered: Miles could’ve snagged a single seat and left Peter to sit next to a stranger.

Miles removes his bag from the other seat when Peter joins him, gratefully taking advantage of the extra room to stretch his legs down the aisle.

“What do you have in there?” Peter asks, trying to make conversation.

Miles glances his way then peels back the zipper so Peter can see. The stuff they bought at the convenience store, a red jacket, a small travel bag full of USBs, chargers, and batteries, and what looks like a black sketchbook. Peter hadn’t even thought about how Miles was going to stay entertained on the ride upstate — two hours of travel time for him means a two-hour naptime — but he hopes Miles might follow his lead and catch a few z’s.

Peter feels a low buzz under his skin, like the beginning of a full-body sneeze, as the last passengers trickle onto the bus. Someone else ends up squeezing next to the tight spot between him and the window. Her back is fortunately turned when Peter’s foot glitches. He manages to keep his reaction to a low hiss, passing it off as a pained _banged-my-ankle_ smile when she looks back at him.

Grimacing, Peter rolls his ankle, drawing his legs in.

Next to him, Miles is — there’s no other word for it — sulking.

Oh for the love of… 

“You’re not still pissed we’re taking the bus, are you?” Peter mutters. In an attempt to be mentor-ly, he offers, “I know you were excited but—”

“I’m not mad,” Miles says. He is absolutely mad.

Peter gives up. Fine, he gets it, he was a horrible teenager once. Teenagers love sulking. He’d be doing them both a favor to leave him to it.

Peter leans his head against the scratchy upholstery, exhaling through his nose. Even slumping, the back of his head tips over the top of the seat. The vent rustles his hair from behind.

He crosses his arms, closes his eyes, and tries to think about nothing.

His mind wanders to his soft duvet back home. It was the only thing from their bedroom he’d taken when he left, _then left packaged inside its box when he couldn’t bear to take it out in the solitude of his new studio_ , don’t think about that, think about nothing, we’re trying to fall asleep here, think about nothing. He thinks of how easy sleep used to come to him when he was younger and back at May’s, and _those old weekly dinners at his aunt’s house_ , back when they used to do those, _before he and May got into that awful fight and didn’t speak for months, and then he got the call, and then there was no more May, and no more MJandPeter, and no more Peter, really, either, just the guy in the mask, but Peter was gone_ …

He nods off to the bumpy rhythm of their journey northward.

When he dreams, it’s about her.

* * *

The thing with MJ —

God.

The thing about the thing with MJ. Is that.

No.

Going on a year now. He still can’t find the words for it.

* * *

He’s back with her, during the waning years, and it’s bad.

He knows he’s dreaming — he never sees her except in dreams these days — but it doesn’t help. Knowing it’s not real never seems to make it any easier.

Adoption day. Peter had never cared much for pets. But MJ had wanted one so badly. Less trouble than kids. You can take it for runs around the block. It can be something we take care of together. You can talk to it when you can’t talk to me. It can sleep with you in the living room when you need space. Peter, please. I want to make this work.

They’re arguing. Peter forgot to pick him up from the pound.

You left him there! Some other family took him home! Did he ever mean anything to you? Why do you not take any of this seriously? He was gonna be part of this family.

We are a family, MJ! We’re fine without it. We’re _fine!_

 _We’re not fine_ , Peter! Stop it!

A dog isn’t going to fix this! Okay? _Nothing is going to fix this!_

* * *

“New Paltz. Next stop, Rosendale.”

Shuffling sounds. Peter cracks his weary eyelids open. Swipes at the corners of his eyes.

The bus has emptied around him. A couple in the front are tromping down the exit stairs with luggage. 

Both seats next to him are empty.

Peter jolts forward, cracking his back unpleasantly. He swipes at a bit of drool on his chin. Where — 

He relaxes when he sees Miles has just relocated to an empty stretch of seats one row up. He’s doodling in his notebook with a highlighter, nodding his head oddly and mouthing something. Peter frowns, then realizes he’s listening to something on his wireless headphones. God, what are those, AirPods? Teenagers here have them too. Why does this kid have to make him feel fifty without even trying?

No, he shouldn’t complain. He remembers how boring car rides were when he was that age. Miles was just smart enough to think ahead.

Peter drops his head again. The back of his skull hits the vent and he snaps “ _ow_ ” without thinking.

“You okay?” Miles is looking at him.

Peter cricks his neck. “Good.”

Miles goes back to his notebook. He’s not mouthing along anymore.

Peter yawns. New Paltz, how long has he been out? He grasps at his pocket for his phone, before remembering that it’s somewhere back home.

“Ki — Miles, what’s the time?”

Miles wakes the screen on his phone and shows it to him. 11:49.

Peter nods his thanks and stretches.

“We’ve got about another half an hour.” Miles pulls one earbud out. “You had another one of those spasms in your sleep. I was gonna wake you but nobody noticed, so I didn’t say anything.”

Peter processes this information about the seizures to dissect for another time. Apparently he can have them without feeling them. “Did you get some sleep?”

“Yeah, I dozed.” Miles removes his other earbud but goes back to doodling. He sees something with yellow and blue triangles, and then Miles sneezes.

“Gesundheit.”

“Thanks.” Miles pulls out a tissue and clears his face, then stuffs it away in an overfull pocket.

Peter pauses. “You getting sick?” He can’t remember the last time he’d gotten sick. He remembers having allergies as a kid, but they disappeared sometime in high school. He always figured the super-healing had something to do with it.

“It’s just a cold,” Miles says, but Peter notes that his eyes are watery.

“Shit,” Peter says out loud, realizing. Miles glances back at him. “I mean shoot. How old are you again?”

“Fourteen.”

“Forget I said anything.”

“You can swear in front of me.” Miles is grinning.

“I said forget it.” Peter checks his pockets for — what? A spare set of his old goggles? The sensitivity lenses in his mask are tailored to his own measurements, besides which, he can’t give his own mask up.

He chews his lip. Another problem to deal with. He hasn’t even figured out what he’s going to do with the kid in a combat situation — sacrificing one of his web-shooters to the cause is not a plan he wants to entertain, but it is starting to seem like the only possibility if they get caught between a rock and a hard place.

Peter clears his throat and leans forward onto his knees, hands clasped. Miles glances back.

“You normally get allergies?”

“No…?”

“If you’re like me, you’ll stop getting sick, but you might notice some hypersensitivity. The frames in my mask lenses help with that, but I don’t have anything for you, and if I did, they probably wouldn’t fit. If you start getting overwhelmed, water helps. Cold medicine, too, but it takes about ten pills for those to do anything for me, and usually it doesn’t last long.”

Miles stares at him for a moment. “Should I be writing this down?”

“If you want.”

Miles flips to a fresh page at the back of his sketchbook and replaces his highlighter with a felt pen. “Okay,” he says after a moment of scribbling. He seems a bit bewildered by Peter’s sudden helpfulness, but doesn’t question it. He looks up when he’s done. 

Peter scratches his scalp, brushing away some dandruff. “Uh, that’s it for now. Or, no, wait. Eat small meals over the day. And start taking supplements. Iron mostly. You burn a lot of calories. Your fingers are gonna get real messed up, so stock some Advil.”

Peter rattles off a couple other tips his half-awake brain can think of, stopping occasionally for Miles to take notes. Miles takes it all in silently, taking advantage of Peter’s yawns to catch up.

“And don’t start drinking coffee till you’re in college. It stunts your growth.”

Miles looks up from his notebook. “How does that help with Spider-Man stuff?”

Peter shrugs. Caffeine had certainly never hurt him in that department, but it felt important to share with the youth. In general.

The thing is that he kind of knows where this is coming from. MJ always thought he’d be a good teacher, and recently he’s had MJ on the brain a lot more often than not. Most of her belief came from his TA years, back in grad school, and the times he’d tutored high school bio. He’d enjoyed it, too, until he started full-timing it at the Bugle and the never-ending Spider-Man thing meant the end of that. But years later on the other side of thirty, whenever he thought of teenagers, something felt different. Instead of the pride he had felt whenever a struggling student succeeded in a problem, or the satisfaction he got when everyone passed an exam, all he could remember instead was how the little shits would replace his whiteboard markers with crayons, or write dates as 4/20, or call him “Mom” in class —

All right. Maybe he’d become a bit of a dick since the divorce. Because despite all of that, he’d liked them. Can’t be certain he really ever taught them a damn thing that stuck, but there was a pleasant thrill that came with knowing he could make a difference without the mask.

And there’s nothing wrong with Miles. He should be encouraged that the kid is actually interested in learning how to do this right, not half-assing it like Peter has been for the past decade.

“What’s your webbing made of?”

“Huh?” Startled, Peter touches his wrists on habit. “A combination of things. I’ve never exactly written it down.” Out of paranoia, mostly. Peter eyes Miles’s pen with caution.

“You don’t _know_?”

“I’m fooling with the formula all the time. I’ll try to remember the measurements later.” Unspoken lies the question of how Miles will recreate the webbing when Peter leaves, with his only other possible teacher dead and buried.

“Do you have, like, business cards?” Miles asks. “That would be so cool.”

Peter stares. “No, I don’t,” he says incredulously. “I don’t run a business. We don’t make money off of this, Miles.”

“Yeah, I know,” Miles says impatiently. “But like, in case of emergencies, someone could call you if they needed you? Or email anonymous tips and stuff?”

“Any problems people are having like that, they’re better of calling the police,” Peter says. “I’m a solo operation, I don’t exactly have a customer service department. I can’t be on call 24-7. Also, do not give out your phone number, whatever you do.”

“Yeah, I’m not stupid.”

Miles jots down a few more things then caps the pen and shoves his things away, reminding Peter very much of a student packing up at the end of class. Which, he is uncomfortably aware, Miles should probably be attending right now.

“Rosendale. Next stop, Kingston.”

Peter chews his lip, eyes passing over the trees blurring by the windows. As they get closer to Alchemax, he becomes less sure what he’s going to do with Miles when they get there. His first instinct with vulnerable passerby is to dump them in a spot that’s as out of the way of the action as possible, but something tells him that won’t work for Miles. Besides which, he’d be doing him a disservice.

Peter kicks the problem down the road a little longer by switching gears. The question of what’s waiting at Alchemax has been on his mind as well. Interdimensional collider? The Kingpin of his universe was a little eccentric in his spending habits, but the largest threat the man carried has always been in his contacts. Who did he hire to make the thing? This universe is strange enough that he shouldn’t presume it’s someone he knows.

Alchemax… when was the last time he visited their Midtown office? Peter racks his brain. Four years ago. Five? Over some nonsense with Elizabeth Allan and Eddie Brock… 

There’s not enough in his memory banks to give him a clue what kind of tech Alchemax might be sporting here. It’s likely this universe plays by different rules anyway. His best resource is the kid currently cleaning gunk out his earphones across the aisle.

Peter can’t delay it much longer — unfortunately not an exaggeration, as their stop draws ever closer — but he’s aware that neither can he rush into the topic.

“Hey, look,” he starts. “My turn for some questions.” He pauses. No polite way to ask this. “I’m going in there blind. I need you to tell me everything you remember about Kingpin, things he had as his disposal. Tech, goons, anything memorable.”

“You mean aside from the huge supercollider the size of a football stadium?”

“Well, yeah, aside from that.”

Miles bites his lip. Shrugs one shoulder. “Just a buncha scientists. And — a tall guy in the armor.”

“ _Tall guy in armor_ ” could fit a lot of villain profiles in Peter’s illustrious database, but it’s not enough to narrow down the pool. “That’s it? No other bodyguards?” _Mercenaries._

“I didn’t really get a good luck at him.” The kid’s avoiding his eyes.

“Miles, this is difficult, but… what I’m really asking is” — _Goddammit_ — “how did the other Peter die?” 

Miles freezes. He drops his eyes and takes a long moment. Peter lets him have it. Finally, Miles says, “I kinda don’t wanna talk about it.” 

Peter sighs. “I’m not asking for fun. If Kingpin caught him off guard, used some new trick, I need to be ready if I run into him in this universe.” It seems a bit inevitable, given his luck. 

“Oh.” Miles is quiet for another long moment. “Well he… the other Peter got caught in the collider explosion, when it blew up. He was already pretty hurt when the scientists found him. Kingpin just… finished him off.” 

Peter had been hoping for more detail. He’s well aware of Fisk’s size and reputation — and fists. His imagination runs. Had it been that brutal, or is Miles leaving something out? 

This boy’s not you, Pete.

He mentally shakes himself. The kid got his powers two days ago. This was… probably the first time he’d ever seen someone die. Not to mention the way he’d idolized him. Now he was on a road trip with a stranger who wore the dead guy’s face — of course it’d be hard to talk about. 

The cold cynic in him almost wants to push it. The same cynic who’d nearly abandoned Miles in the alley, the one who’d left his ring on MJ’s bedside table the day he moved out to avoid the humiliating honesty of a goodbye, the one who cut first before he got cut. He wants to tell Miles death is something he’d have to get used to if he wants to be Spider-Man. Even the best intentions gets people killed if luck doesn’t favor you; even trying your hardest isn’t enough sometimes. But he can’t say it.

“You said Kingpin’s after you,” Peter says slowly. “He knew your name?”

“I don’t think he knows who I am. It was dark. He heard a noise. He just sent one of his henchmen after me.” Miles is still avoiding his eyes. In the bus seat, he curls up, an arm around one knee. “Prowler, I think they call him. He wears dark purple. And he had these… Gloves. Claws.” Miles stares down at his hands, slowly flexing, as if to demonstrate. A pause. Would-be casually: “Is he, uh, in your universe, too?”

The name doesn’t ring a bell, but Fisk employs maniacs with personalized themed weapons as easily as licensed mercenaries, not like Peter’s going to tell him that. It sounds like Kingpin had crushed the blonde guy to death, then as good as sent an assassin after Miles, and coupled with the burden of a promise made to his blonde counterpart…there’s a lot of things to process here. Hm.

It strikes Peter again just how young Miles is. The posturing back in his uncle’s apartment had immediately given Peter flashes of _young; influenceable; teenager, probably the type smart enough to think for himself, but stupid enough to think he knows better than adults._ Sounds like fourteen.

Jesus, Peter couldn’t ever remember being that young. He barely remembers his childhood. Most days it seems like his life had began with the bite, as if anything that came before had been someone other kid living for him as a placeholder until he put on the mask.

Something heavy forms in his chest as he realizes he is now responsible for Miles’s safety, by virtue of being the only adult with any knowledge of his situation in the immediate vicinity. The familiar panic begins to well up in his gut, the same tight-chested frozen-lung feeling he used to get whenever MJ said the dreaded words “ _I want to talk about our future_.” The same overwhelming, paralyzing sensation of futility, like the train was coming fast, and he’s tied to the tracks with his own webbing.

 _This is why I never said yes, this is why I never did that_ … 

Knowing his luck, Miles would get hurt or worse today, and then because Peter has more morals than common sense, he would assuredly find himself confessing to this kid’s perfectly ordinary parents how he, an adult stranger with no searchable paper trail wearing clothes he’d rummaged out of a bin, had kidnapped their child to rob a high-tech security campus with the eventual goal of breaking into a secret bunker owned by the city’s richest jackass — and blah blah blah, this is _exactly_ why he does the solo thing. No sidekicks, nobody else’s feelings or opinions he had to contend with, nobody’s health and safety he had to worry over, goddammit, he’d had a good thing going on his own. Why had he said yes?

Peter has his face in his hands and his heart beating in his throat when he realizes he has left Miles unanswered for several seconds. “Um.” He clears his throat. The Prowler. Right. “No, I don’t know him in my universe.”

Miles glances at him out of the corner of his eye, then determinedly goes back to staring out the window at the trees rushing by. He scrubs at an eye. Hypersensitivity, possibly. But probably not.

Peter fidgets, uncomfortably aware he’s out of his depth with this whole thing. Comforting kids usually comes as second nature, but this is different. He recalls every first response lesson he’d learned on the job about calming down traumatized children, every cautious approach to a battered teenager, and wonders if it will be enough. Respect their autonomy, meet them halfway, trust in their ability to read him in return. Miles has his own powers, though, and he isn’t the type to be comforted with platitudes; besides which they wouldn’t help anyway. He’s seen his idol get murdered in front of him. Nothing Peter ever says could rectify that.

Peter can turn on the comforting demeanor when he wants to. Spider-Man is the friend you want when you are scared or shaken and don’t know your way back home. He is excellent at getting kids and strangers to trust him in crisis scenarios. The mask is just a mask without someone believable behind it, and over the course of twenty-two years he’s perfected the whole Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man thing like he was born into it. MJ used to say in another life he might’ve made an excellent first responder. He is good at keeping kids distracted from the danger, quick to get a laugh, and talks panicked victims through what he will do to save their lives before he does it. When he puts in the effort. 

That’s the problem. It had just — been a while, since he’d last really tried.

“I know this is difficult to talk about,” he starts gently. He has a sudden thought. “Can I see your phone?”

Startled but complying, Miles digs into his bag. He pulls out a lanyard and with the jagged edge of a key, opens the plastic packaging to hand the phone over. Peter pulls out his own from his overcoat.

“I’m putting them both on silent,” Peter says, “but we’ll be each other’s speed dial.”

Miles looks half skeptical, like he knows he’s being humored, but he surprises Peter when he blurts out, “Sorry I’m not being very helpful.”

His heart clenches. “Don’t be sorry.” He opens the flip phones, grateful to have something to do with his hands. “Look, Miles, I’ve never really done this before, explained… how to do what I do. After so long it just gets instinctual, and I sure as hell never had the time to write it all down when I was younger.”

He closes his phone and sets it aside. “But that whole power and responsibility spiel…” Peter chews a lip. Ever since that damn comic published, he’d never heard the end of it. He wondered if this universe’s Peter had hated it as much as he does. But he had never tried expressing his feelings about it other than in halting, frustrated, insufficient attempts to MJ, who didn’t understand, could never.

And yet…

_We are all Spider-Man. And we’re all counting on you._

“I suppose it’s just… not what I think of when I think of who Spider-Man is. This shouldn’t be a burden. An obligation, sure, but… I started doing this because I realized a lot of times what we need to stop bad things from happening is just for one person to just — say something, do something. _That’s_ who Spider-Man is. The guy who’s there. It’s the person you always secretly wished you were. This is your chance to be that person.”

Peter finishes with Miles’s phone and flips it back shut. “Even if you forget everything else, or decide I’m some old Gen Xer who doesn’t remember what it’s like to be a teenager and you’re gonna ignore everything I say, that’s the one thing I want you to remember when you get out there. Be the guy who’s there, be the one who tries. Even if you fail. Being there makes a difference. You got me?”

Quietly, and very seriously, Miles says, “Kay. Yeah.”

“Cool. That outfit of yours have pockets?”

Miles rustles his green hooded jacket from where he has a hand in his pocket. “This does.”

“You can’t wear that in there,” Peter says. “You want to be Spider-Man, right? You’re already wearing the costume. Don’t hide behind something else.”

Miles snorts and looks away, but he looks pleased. When the announcer calls for Kingston, he collects his bag and follows Peter down the aisle with notably more willingness than he’d shown back at the station. Feeling vaguely as though he might have done something right for the first time in two days — possibly two years — Peter stretches and leads him out into the bright, chilly December air.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Ess-a-Bagel](https://www.ess-a-bagel.com/): A real, delicious place. Contrary to what the website implies, they have more than one location. The name is Yiddish for “eat a bagel.” My friend V came up with “Nosh-a-Knish” as an alternate name for the deli in Miles's world (a [knish](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knish) being a baked or fried dough snack associated with Jewish NYC community, though they're not as popular as bagels).


End file.
